I don’t think I’ve pushed this before, but “Master Resource,” a new free market energy blog, is in full swing. Not everyone posting there is necessarily an Austrian (though some of us are), but everybody is definitely aware of the problems of government intervention.
More important, the posters really know what they are talking about. In particular, I want to draw your attention to Chip Knappenberger, who is a co-author and works with global warming “skeptic” Pat Michaels. Before I publish anything relating to climate models, I run it past Chip to make sure I don’t embarrass myself. (True, I still embarrass myself, but on non-climate issues.) Check out his post on the hysterical warnings about global warming ruining crop yields. (Hint: the most pessimistic projections assume farmers are morons and don’t react.) Chip posts the charts below which show that the warming of the 20th century certainly didn’t harm crop yields:
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Hint: the most pessimistic projections assume farmers are morons and don’t react.
That’s something I always find funny about the environmentalists. Its a feature that seems inherent in all of them, the concept of static human beings. Humans that don’t create new technology, dispose of old ones, look for more efficient means, change habits to suit current needs, etc.
Over the summer, I saw that movie WALL-E, a movie with an environmental message. In it, a large corporation took over everything and the people of the world, over generations, became fat, lazy and stupid. The Earth was depleted and covered in trash and the human race had to leave it behind. (The corporate monopoly angle was also another point of the movie that was inherently stupid.)
I enjoyed the animation and some of the characters, but thought the movie was incredibly stupid in its premise. It assumed, like many environmentalist types do, that life (humans especially) just sits still for impending doom to come.
Could you give us an embiggen option and lines on that graph, so we could actually look more closely at the year to year correlation and variation?
Or perhaps give us a linear correlation analysis? Plot annual temp against yield and examine the Pearson’s r.
I am betting that there is a whopping strong correlation between annual average temp and yield, but there are confounding factors that would need to be controlled in the analysis.
One problem with examining the data for the past century, is that farming practices changed dramatically in the early-to-mid 20th, accounting for a large part of the yield growth. Perhaps a better statistic to use would be yield per acre, and to look at only the correlation over the past two or three decades.
A more complicated analysis would also control for annual rainfall, number of cloudy days, etc., all of which are available from NOAA.
Oops, my bad. I did not look closely enough at the fine print, “bu/ac” is the units of the first graph.
On the cited page, Knappenberger makes my point that changes in farming practice and technology are the most critical factor in rising productivity (as Austrians would expect). Yet I would still bet that climate warming leads to longer growing seasons and greater yield, independent of the other variables that affect yield.
It is also vital to recognize that, even if the climate is warming up, that will not seriously affect agriculture on the global scale. Longer and warmer seasons will increase yields in farther northern latitudes, which will likely increase worldwide productivity. Siberia and Canada will be the new bread baskets, and the central temperate latitudes will be able to grow more vegetables and fruits, with warmer climates and longer seasons.
It is just nonsensical Malthusianism to claim that global warming, whether anthropogenic or not, will lead to famine.
But the real problem is whether we can adapt to the global warming. Unfortunately, it seems to me that adaption has not been emphasized as it should. This means that those countries less prepared to the consequences to global warming will be faced with disaster. Not to mention the unintended consequences of some policies, such as subziding housing near the sea.
“It is just nonsensical Malthusianism to claim that global warming, whether anthropogenic or not, will lead to famine.”
I agree to some extent. It is true that Global warming by itself wouldn’t lead famine. That said, considering how the techniques used for cultivating the land in less-developed countries and let us throw the occasional internal conflicts, you can expect famine to be at least slightly worse with global warming. Of course, this point is hardly heard from those who are agitating for governmental action regarding global warming (e.g.: renewable energy).
But the real problem is whether we can adapt to the global warming.
I will give you my grim prediction that those places where people’s freedom and the free market are terribly stifled, will not be able to cope as quickly as those that enjoy even relative economic freedom and a free (or free-er) market. The PRICE system is such a wonderful signaling device, it gives people prompt information on potential scarcity problems and opportunities IF these arise due to changes in global temperatures.
So, people that live under some sort of tyrannical regime that doesn’t allow people to participate in free markets and give each other signals through prices could POTENTIALLY suffer famines or other disasters. Think Myanmar, or Bangladesh…
… Or Obama’s USA.
Yikes!! We had better stop growing corn right now, or the planet is going to burn up!
That’s something I always find funny about the environmentalists. Its a feature that seems inherent in all of them, the concept of static human beings.
Well, dead human beings (the desired endgame for at least some greens) are as static as you get. Once 5.9 billion or so of us are gone, Bob’s your uncle.
That environmentalists are not necessarily economically savvy is a given. That economists are not environmentally savvy should also be taken into consideration.
It seems that Austrians are choosing to focus on “hysterical warnings” and question the scientific reality of global warming instead of helping environmentalists apply sound economic theory to the very serious issues of climate change. This leaves environmentalists wide open to socialist influence.
I choose instead to educate my environmentally savvy, economically challenged friends on the detriments of their often touted regulatory or outright socialist methodologies for mitigating climate change.
I wish more Austrians on this site would do the same.
Ignoring or arguing the science of climate change only because environmentalists so often turn to economically detrimental methods of mitigation is no way to handle this very real crisis.
I in turn like to view the vocal outlandishness of environmentalists as a form of market demand which is indeed shaping supply side decisions by the world’s largest corporations. (Clean energy, corporate waste reduction, sustainable materials, distribution efficiency, etc.)
I hope that the world’s best economists (Austrians of course) can also begin to supply sound economic support for this demand without alienating an admittedly economically ignorant group of strong political activists.
The growing body of individuals deeply concerned by the degradation of earth’s resources should be viewed as potential allies in the struggle for true and universal liberty.
At the moment, Fed regulation seems like the only viable avenue of appeal for environmental advocates. We know this is most likely not going to be helpful or sufficient and will reduce liberty.
Ron Paul advocates the judicial defense of property rights as the libertarian method for dealing with pollution. I am not certain how effective this would be when considering the wide spread corporate and individual responsibility for climate change. (Who do you sue?)
Without reverting to climate change denial (let’s leave the environmental science to the environmental scientists), what other methods would Austrians recommend?
PS. Global warming is only one of the issues concerning environmentalists. Ocean acidification, massive extinction and subsequent loss of biodiversity, fresh water degradation, disease causing pollution, etc etc the list goes on.
Jim, if global warming were a serious issue, harmful carbon taxes and the like would do nothing to slow the problem. They would only slow economic growth and make human life more miserable. Instead, by focusing on free markets, humans would have the option of leaving high-risk property that has the potentiality to be flooded for low-risk property in-land. People would also be incentivized to insure their high flood risk property and to better protect it via forest land, swampland, levees, and the like.
Free markets would allow the economy to grow AND humans to adopt to global warming, leaving everyone better off.
Jim, if global warming were a serious issue, harmful carbon taxes and the like would do nothing to slow the problem. They would only slow economic growth and make human life more miserable. Instead, by focusing on free markets, humans would have the option of leaving high-risk property that has the potentiality to be flooded for low-risk property in-land. People would also be incentivized to insure their high flood risk property and to better protect it via forest land, swampland, levees, and the like.
Free markets would allow the economy to grow AND humans to adapt to global warming, leaving everyone better off.
AJ – Thanks for the response. I do agree with your assessment of carbon taxation and your prediction of how free markets will allow us to re-value and protect our properties.
The intention of my original response was to point out the potential harm in trying to convince anyone (especially environmentalists) that climate change is unproven or unreal thereby alienating a growing portion of the politically empowered.
Additionally, the goal of environmentalists is to prevent the need for humans to “adapt” to climate change. That is why they are focusing on attempts to preemptively reduce carbon emissions.
There is a swelling movement of people changing their own behavior and buying decisions to lower their carbon impacts. The market IS beginning to respond. (wind, solar, green design, etc.) These personal approaches and market response fit a libertarian approach to climate change mitigation. However, the use of federal authority to mandate these currently voluntary carbon reductions is an overwhelming temptation to the environmental community.
Therefore, it is our duty, in support of freedom, to argue not the science of climate change but the means by which others would reduce our liberty. We may in the process convert otherwise rational individuals to a higher standard of political economics.
In the first place, nearly all of the increase in crop yields is attributable to the increased oil intensity of agricultural production processes in the United States. It’s continually increasing inputs of petroleum- or natural gas-derived fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides, combined with more and better oil-burning capital equipment. Needless to say, the oil is running out; I don’t subscribe to the doom-and-gloom peak oil pseudo-science, but oil production will peak some time in the near future, which will cause an enormous economic contraction if not anticipated through public policy measures (indeed, there’s a good argument to be made that many of our current economic problems are due to peak oil). Modern agriculture is most at risk in this regard, as nearly everything about it consumes vast amounts of oil.
Now, the market will – eventually – correct on its own to adopt sustainable ag practices, but why endure an unnecessary depression just to avoid taking remedial action?
I suggest a compromise. Instead of just continuing to ignore the three inseparable issues of oil supply, climate change, and a corrupt, imperialistic foreign policy, how about this: place an immediate moratorium on construction of coal-fired power plants; the recent coal ash spill in TN, combined with the non-climate-related environmental degradation inherent in burning coal (i.e., more people have been exposed to more radiation from coal’s waste products than from all of the nuclear reactors in the world, Chernobyl included), provides ample justification for such a ban. Sorry, but even under a libertarian ethical paradigm, you don’t have the right to dump your toxic, mildly-radioactive waste into my atmosphere.
Next, implement a $.003 per BTU tax on oil and coal, levied at the well-head/mine, to be slowly increased until the climate, energy, and security problems are rectified. The hypothetical bill should legally entrench the revenue from this, requiring it to fund the transition costs of Social Security privatization.
BAM! Enviros are happy, libertarians/conservatives are happy; the coal industry isn’t, but screw them. Win/win.
Jim,
I agree wholeheartedly that Austrian believers need to argue for rational economic solutions, rather than try to convince fanatics they are wrong about global warming. In my post, I never argued that global warming is not occurring, I simply tried to point out that doomsday predictions are ludicrous hyperbole. Warmer climate may worsen the desertification of the Sahara, but it will likely also increase agricultural productivity in other regions, due to longer growing seasons. This is a point that environmentalists refuse to consider.
Humans are amazingly adaptive creatures, and have survived tens of thousands of years of climate fluctuations, and spread to every continent but Antarctica, across such widely different climates as deserts and tundra, long before modern civilization arose. We will continue to adapt and thrive, and improve the average standard of living worldwide, irrespective of climate changes. Despots and governments come and go, but civilization marches onward, despite them.
Hayek described the problem of “Fatal Conceit,” the belief on the part of central planners that their wisdom could solve all problems without creating even worse new ones. Hazlitt stated so elegantly in “Economics in One Lesson” the problem of unintended consequences of policy decisions.
What we need to convince environmentalists of is not that they are wrong about whether the climate is changing, but that the solutions lie in the amazing adaptability of human societies through the mechanisms of voluntary exchange. This fundamental concept, the underpinning of liberty and free markets, as well as all progress in civilization, is what we need to highlight. Using this concept, rather than ideology-fraught jargon such as “capitalism” or “socialism” or “laissez faire,” when we describe the problems due to government-based solutions, will help to educate those who have been misled by the statist propaganda and media. (Such as Elitist, above).
As Torres points out above, it is not climates that kill people, but governments that restrict their freedom to adapt.
Jim,
I am an Austrian, I am a Libertarian and I am 100% certain that Global Warming is true and is threatening the survival of mankind.
That said, I still believe that government, taxes, regulations are a far greater threat to the survival of mankind.
I think that we should preserve private property, free market capitalism and the rule of law.
And I think that individual freedoms and private ownership are the best way to fight global warming.
Just look at Soviet Russia and how it littered it’s country with nuclear waste and waste in general. That’s because private property did not exist in Soviet Russia, in fact people did not even own themselves. People were the property of the government and therefore the government was allowed to experiment on their own people.
So a collectivist tyrannical approach is going to kill us all in the name of saving us.
Even if global warming is a real threat, the government is a far greater threat and I would rather we eliminate the government before we tackle global warming.
After all, back a few tens of millions of years in the dinosaur age, there were no polar ice caps because the earth was so hot and so filled with CO2 that water did not exist in the form of ice.
This did not stop life from thriving and expanding and we are the proof today that a once war planet was not killing life.
We should survive global warming and we should be able as free individuals to adapt to it.
However, I don’t think we will survive the government if we don’t put an end to their tyrannical madness.
Elitist-
There is so much wrong with your post, but I will not address most of it. You can get a great economics education (for free, if you like) by perusing what this website has to offer. I would suggest reading what the scholars here have to say about the cause of depressions, because it’s not oil.
You said:
And then go on to recommend ways to curtail coal and oil use. Are you suggesting that you are not opposed to the resulting cut in crop yields? Food is a basic necessity for life, and people around the world rely on the current abundant supplies of inexpensive grains for survival. So I can’t understand why a compassionate person would propose such a callous solution just because they are impatient for the market to work.
That global warming is true or false is not the question.
The question is should we or should we not assault private property rights, assault individual freedoms and assault the rule of law in the name of fighting global warming.
The answer is NO we should not assault individuals in the name of global warming.
Therefore, the whole debate on wether global warming is true or false is a dangerous distraction against the real debate about wether we should trample individual rights or not in response to global warming.
As a libertarian, I believe that global warming is true but I also believe that individual rights are the best way to fight global warming.
I believe we should not assault individuals in the name of fighting global warming and I oppose such collectivist and government interventions.
I am extremely skeptical of global warming. I’m open to the idea, but I don’t believe the science has been settled at all.
I’ll post my comment from this article by David Gordon:
The Dangers of Disputing Warming Orthodoxy
http://blog.mises.org/archives/009210.asp
David Gordon’s article was excellent and the comments to the article were very interesting. In particular, a poster named “poptech” posted numerous links related to the science.
The believing mind is externally impervious to evidence. The most that can be accomplished with it is to induce it to substitute one delusion for another. It rejects all overt evidence as wicked…
The fact that I have no remedy for all the sorrows of the world is no reason for my accepting yours. It simply supports the strong probability that yours is a fake.
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